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Friday, August 21, 2009

With not one but two signature scents under her belt, M by Mariah Carey and Luscious Pink, and a third one, Forever, just about to launch this September, Mariah Carey seems more set on perfumes than music albums it seems. She’s debuting her ads online exclusively on PEOPLE.com, from where the pic is weaned from. According to Mariah:“Fragrance is so personal and Forever captures that glamorous feeling that I want to share with my fans.” Forever is described as an "opulent floral scent, which will contain notes of lotus blossom, tuberose, gardenia, exotic woods and white musk". The fragrance will retail for $42 for a 1-oz. spray.

What I have to note concerning the imagery chosen by Elizabeth Arden, the company under the aegis of which Mariah's perfumes are materialised, is that the picture looks a little skewed and quite Photoshopped to make Mariah a bit ...unrecognisable. Maybe not as heavily Photoshopped as this ad for Chanel with Keira Knightley we discussed the other day, but messed with, at any rate.I love the 30s satin dress in ivory and the choice of glitzy art-deco jewelry to match the style like a silver screen siren (shades of Jean Harlow), but the pose of Mariah looks unnatural ~whose hair would adopt such an angle, since if you notice she's not really leaning on the cushions~ and her face looks weird; I've seen her in better pics, honestly! The bottle of the fragrance also looks a little...hmmm....Anyway, best of luck to her I suppose and hope she gets back to recording her amazing voice.

Oh yeah! Say that again! What a try-hard that Keira ad was...and for no reason, really. This one is actually quite classy in its setting/art-direction (they could have showed nipple but they didn't, good on them). I would have preferred it if they had opted for such an approach for something that was more ambitious as a scent, but one can't have it all I guess ;-)

Oh, I adored her in the 90s. I learned English from her records - that is, after the Beatles and the Rollings and right before Sinatra period :) She was great at the time, and she sounds (and looks) so differently now. I also agree with you, the ad could be totally silver screen goddess-like, but the face expression doesn't match! I see her as a vamp seductress here :) And there's a consistent problem with the bottle design - I didn't like the previous either.

Something definitely not-quite-right about the picture, although the concept and art direction are good. And the fragrance name, Forever, is remarkable in that it hasn't been used before, has it? I wonder if it says anything about its persistance...

If I were to pose like this for a minute, I'd get terrible cramps in those muscles that hold my head up (Sternocleidomastoid muscles, for detailists). And I know, I overstretched the very same muscle:D

re Anonymous: woe upon those who'd like to copyright common words and phrases.

how nice for you! I used to learn tons of foreign languages through songs and films as well :-) (aren't they a great tool?)She looks a little too stretched for her own good here. I doubt Jean Harlow would pose like that, ever. There was something languid and lazy about those poses these days, not so much worrying about highlighting the contours of a muscled-up thigh! ;-)

Y'know, you just can't be all things to all people and Mariah is not what she is not, and what she is not is a languid 30's screen goddess. There's not enough image manipulation machinery or photoshop on the planet to make that so.

There really isn't anything so terrible about what she is, so why not leave it there?

you make an excellent point! We shouldn't be overpicky because well, that's not her strong suit, very true. But the advertising and marketing team had a different opinion obviously, maybe this is their "glam" scent in the line...

I believe that pic of Mariah I linked on the pic is quite pretty and showcases what's best in her: a simpler, more modern, upbeat & hip kinda "pretty". Nothing wrong with that. :-)

I tried this on at Sephora yesterday. It smells exactly--and i mean exactly!-- like Giorgio, one of the best-loved fragrances from the 1980's, but even better, because it lacks Giorgio's overpowering strength. It's like a whisper instead of a shout.

Elena Vosnaki is executive editor of Fragrantica.gr, the leader in fragrance information in Greek, as well as a senior editor for the top english-speaking Fragrantica.com webzine.

Vosnaki has been Fragrance Expert on About.com and the Perfume History Curator of the Be Open Foundation exhibitionThe Garden of Wonders, A Journey in Scents in Milan. Her writing has been twice shortlisted in the FIFI Editorial Excellence Awards and is extensively quoted by authors. She is an evaluating expert on Osmoz.com.

Perfume Shrine is an award winning blog of 1000s of fragrance reviews (modern, niche, classic, vintage), articles on perfume history and aroma materials, comparisons of scents, interviews with perfumers & the fragrance industry, perfume shopping as well as scented travel memoirs, fine cuisine, tips on building a fragrance wardrobe and musings about the pleasures of the senses.